Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party lost an election in a key state he visited frequently before the recent virus surge forced him off the campaign trail, adding to growing signs of a backlash over his government’s handling of the world’s worst COVID-19 outbreak.
In West Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s All India Trinamool Congress won about 72 percent of 292 seats up for grabs, while Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) took 77, according to results posted by the Election Commission of India yesterday.
Last month, Modi predicted that his party would win more than 200 seats in the state, which held voting over eight phases starting on March 27.
Photo: Reuters
Modi’s opponents won in the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala, while his party kept power in the northeastern state of Assam and gained the federally controlled territory of Puducherry, where it contested in alliance with a regional party.
He conceded West Bengal in a series of posts on Twitter, congratulating Banerjee, while adding that BJP made gains in the state.
The focus will now be how well policymakers are able to minimize the socioeconomic cost of COVID-19, said Madhavi Arora, an economist at Emkay Global Financial Services Ltd.
“It could also have implications for 2022 state elections,” Arora said, including the major BJP-held states of Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat.
Grim scenes of overcrowded crematoriums and pleas for oxygen have overshadowed the election in the past few weeks, with Modi coming under fire for campaigning in front of huge crowds as infections were spiraling.
“As three strongly anti-BJP regional leaders have emerged victorious, they are likely to be the nucleus of the opposition challenge to Modi in the months ahead as he battles the backlash to his mismanagement of the COVID crisis,” said Arati Jerath, a New Delhi-based author and political analyst who has written about Indian politics for nearly three decades.
The results weaken the government and indicate there are “huge political and constitutional challenges ahead for Modi,” she said.
India yesterday reported 368,147 new COVID-19 cases and 3,417 deaths — numbers that experts believe are vast undercounts because of a widespread lack of testing and incomplete reporting.
The Indian Ministry of Health said that it has confirmed 19.9 million COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic, behind only the US, which has counted more than 32.4 million.
It said that more than 218,000 people have died.
The southern state of Karnataka yesterday said that 24 COVID-19 patients died at a government-run hospital amid reports of an oxygen shortage.
It was unclear how many died due to a lack of oxygen, but the chief minister ordered an investigation.
Additional reporting by AP
CLOSURES: Several forest recreation areas have been closed as a precaution, while some ferry and flight services have been suspended or rescheduled A land warning for Tropical Storm Danas was issued last night at 8:30pm, as the storm’s outer bands began bringing heavy rain to southeastern regions, including Hualien and Taitung counties, and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春半島), according to the Central Weather Administration (CWA). As of 9:15pm, the storm was approximately 330km west-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, moving north-northeast at 10-20kph, the CWA reported. A sea warning had already been issued at 8:30am yesterday. The storm had maximum sustained winds near its center of 83kph, with gusts of up to 108kph, according to the CWA. As of 9:30pm last night, Kaohsiung, Tainan,
POWERFUL DETERRENT: Precision fire and dispersed deployment of units would allow Taiwanese artillery to inflict heavy casualties in an invasion, a researcher said The nation’s military has boosted its self-defense capability with the establishment of a new company equipped with the US-supplied High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS). The company, part of the army’s 58th Artillery Command, is Taiwan’s first HIMARS unit. Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄), who presided over the formation ceremony in Taichung on Friday, called the unit a significant addition to the nation’s defensive strength, saying it would help deter adversaries from starting a war. The unit is made up of top-performing soldiers who received training in the US, according to the Ministry of National Defense. The HIMARS can be equipped with
UNILATERAL: The move from China’s aviation authority comes despite a previous 2015 agreement that any changes to flight paths would be done by consensus The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday slammed Beijing for arbitrarily opening the M503 flight route’s W121 connecting path, saying that such unilateral conduct disrespected the consensus between both sides and could destabilize the Taiwan Strait and the wider region. The condemnation came after the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) earlier yesterday announced it “has activated the W121 connecting path of the M503 flight route,” meaning that west-to-east flights are now permitted along the path. The newly activated west-to-east route is intended to “alleviate the pressure caused by the increase of flights,” China’s state-run Xinhua news agency quoted China’s Taiwan Affairs Office
STRONG WINDS: Without the Central Mountain Range as a shield, people should be ready for high-speed winds, CWA weather forecaster Liu Yu-chi said Danas was yesterday upgraded to a typhoon and could grow stronger as it moves closely along the nation’s west coastline, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Hsinchu and Chiayi cities, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung, as well as Hsinchu, Miaoli, Changhua, Yunlin, Nantou, Chiayi, Penghu and Pingtung counties have canceled work and school today. Work and school in Keelung, Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan, and Yilan, Taitung, Hualien, Kinmen and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties would continue as usual, although offices and schools would be closed in Taoyuan’s Luju (蘆竹), Dayuan (大園), Guangyin (觀音) and Sinwu (新屋) districts. As of 5pm yesterday, the typhoon’s
RSS